Sure, but you can't ask a team of bricklayers to assemble a livable house. In fact in this analogy it's so obvious that you also need an architect, a plumber, etc, that there's no need to even mention it. But when it comes to programmers and (corporate) management it's a whole different story. They will get a team of 'bricklayers' together and tell them to build the next Youtube - or a bit close to home, the next corporate content distribution platform - and then be utterly dumbfounded when that blows up in their face.

Isolated in the middle of the Pacific Ocean and at over 11,000 feet above sea level, the upper north face of Mauna Loa volcano is an ideal location to make measurements of atmospheric carbon dioxide that reflect global trends, not local influences such as factories or forests that might boost or drop carbon dioxide within their vicinity. The CO2 sensors at Mauna Loa are positioned such that they sample an incoming breeze direct from the ocean, unaffected by human activities, vegetation or other factors on the island. (The Mauna Loa Observatory is high enough that the incoming breeze rides above the thermal inversion layer.)

Volcanoes are considerable sources of carbon dioxide themselves. However, the sampling location was chosen to be normally upwind of Mauna Loa's vent, and Keeling perfected methods for detecting and correcting intervals when the wind blew the wrong way.

Measurements at about 100 other sites have confirmed the long-term trend shown by the Keeling Curve, although no sites have a record as long as Mauna Loa.

I'm no expert on the matter either. But I can imagine that a sea level rise of a few meters (at the turn of the century) will results in tremendous economic damage (relocation of hundreds of million of people *and* real estate, as most of the population on Earth is housed in large cities in coastal regions), famine (due to loss of agricultural land), and territorial conflicts.

In any case, I think we have now arrived at the point where anyone that has children born after 2010 finds oneself in the situation where ones children, and grandchildren are going to be seriously affected by climate change and overpopulation. Those have to ask themselves what they are going to tell their grandchildren, 50 years from now, about how they had the ability to make a difference but couldn't agree on how bad it was going to be and therefore decided inaction was the best course of action.

SpiderOak is also a cross platform synchronization and share tool and does everything DropBox does (only a bit better) except that it allows you to sync as many folders on as many computers as you like. And for 100 dollar a year (50 if you're a student) you can get 100GB extra (up to 5 TB).

I am in no way affiliated with SiperOak, just a satisfied user. The only thing I worry about with SpiderOak and Dropbox is what kind of lifespan they have. Will they still be around in 5 - 10 years?

The problem:
(consumer) Wants to listen to whatever song he likes, whenever he likes, on whatever device he has available and as often as he wants (maybe once, maybe hundreds of times), i.e. wants to feel free. For a to him reasonable price (ranging from nothing to the equivalent of a comparable service - say... being able to call anyone he likes, whenever he likes on whatever device he has available and as often as he wants )maybe once, maybe hundreds of times) or more exactly the price of a phone subscription nowadays.
(industry) Wants to profit as much as possible for every single song, preferably wants people to pay the full-price even if they only ever listen to the song once. Want to control the consumer because they feel more they control results in more purchases.
Or in other words consumer demand and industry supply do not match. Until this is fixed, this remains the root of the problem.

Once that problem has been fixed, *then* you can think about punishments like: if you downloaded 1000 songs a month illegally, then you will have to pick up a subscription that allows you to do that legally for an amount of time proportional to your 'offense'. Sure it will cost you a bit, but you get something for it in return, something you were consuming already before anyways. Once you start paying for it you realize maybe that perhaps you only 'need' 100 songs a month, or 10 or none, and after you have paid your dues you can scale down your subscription again. I honestly believe this is the only way it is ever going to work.

It's not an easy task, for sure: it requires investing in infrastructure (cellular or broadband Internet) or facilities to 'charge' your iPod or other music at a local store or internet cafe, and maybe settling for a lower profit margin and less instantaneous income (as is the case when selling and single or album) because instead the money 'trickles' in. Of course playing your cards right could actually result in increased sales because people consume relatively more (it's easy and relatively cheaper). Rather than paying 50 bucks for 1 album to listen to over and over again, you can listen to to maybe 10.000 songs a month choosing out of an infinite amount of songs available. I know which option I'd pick and actually find reasonable to pay for.

They are conveniently called U-Specs and are currently in the process of being manufactured on a mass produced scale for as cheap as a dollar or two (or not more than a few dollars), i.e. cheap enough to be actually usuable by people who cannot afford custom made prescription glasses.

The principle is very simple as well, based on the work by Nobelprize winner Alvarez: slide two specially shaped lenses over each other (by means of a slider) and achieve any focus in a wide range of a few diopters.

mystuff writes: Frequently linked to from Slashdot is Microsoft Enterprise billboard onwindows.com, which according to the (google cached) is about providing "a single source of news, information and resources about Microsoft technologies in the enterprise. Whether you are already using Windows or are planning to do so, you will find a wealth of information about how Microsoft and its partners are helping businesses in your industry." Naturally the server hosting this site are running Windows, but as turns out that might not have been the best of choices... as the site was hacked by C4patr0n from Turkey, and this is how it looks now:
Snapshot 18:15 UTC Sunday July 5th